Konstantinos Votanopoulos, MD, PhD, FACS
Konstantinos Votanopoulos is a surgical oncologist at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, a Professor of Surgical Sciences and Cancer Biology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and a Professor at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. He specializes in the use of cytoreductive surgery with hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy for the treatment of abdominal malignancies, including malignant peritoneal mesothelioma.[1]
Education and Career
Dr. Votanopoulos earned his medical degree at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Thessaloniki, Greece. He completed General Surgical residencies at both the University of Athens and Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, Texas, then completed his medical training with a fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute.[1]
Professional Memberships
Dr. Votanopoulos is an active member of several professional medical societies, including:[1]
- Hellenic Surgical Society
- American College of Surgeons
- American Society of Clinical Oncology
- Society of Surgical Oncology
- American Medical Association
- Southern Surgical Association
- Association of Academic Surgery
- Michael E. DeBakey International Surgical Society
- Hellenic Society of Cancer Research
- American Society of Peritoneal Surface Malignancies
- Society of University Surgeons
Research
In addition to his clinical role, Dr. Votanopoulos is the Director of Wake Forest’s Organoid Research Center, a program that is working to leverage tumor organoid technology to transform cancer care at the level of the individual patient.[1]
Organoids are tiny, self-organized three-dimensional tissue cultures derived from stem cells. Dr. Votanopoulos removes these cells during surgery and later reconstructs them in the lab, perfusing them with chemotherapy in an attempt to determine which drug combination will be most effective for the individual patient before treatment. In this way, drug use is individualized to the patient’s specific tumor, thus improving the potential outcome of treatment.
Recent publications include:[1]
Lung Surveillance Strategy for High-Grade Soft Tissue Sarcomas: Chest X-Ray or CT Scan? Gamboa AC, Ethun CG, Switchenko JM, Lipscomb J, Poultsides GA, Grignol V, Howard JH, Gamblin TC, Roggin KK, Votanopoulos K, Fields RC, Maithel SK, Delman KA, Cardona K. J Am Coll Surg. 2019 11; 229(5):449-457.
· Outcomes After Adjuvant Hyperthermic Intraperitoneal Chemotherapy for High-Risk Primary Appendiceal Neoplasms After Complete Resection. Enomoto LM, Choudry MH, Bartlett DL, Totin L, Mann GN, Skitzki JJ, Perry KC, Votanopoulos KI, Levine EA, Shen P. Ann. Surg. Oncol. 2020 Jan; 27(1):107-114.
· Assessing the Role of Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy in Primary High-Risk Truncal/Extremity Soft Tissue Sarcomas: An Analysis of the Multi-institutional U.S. Sarcoma Collaborative. Zaidi MY, Ethun CG, Tran TB, Poultsides G, Grignol VP, Howard JH, Bedi M, Mogal H, Tseng J, Roggin KK, Chouliaras K, Votanopoulos K, Krasnick B, Fields RC, Oskouei S, Reimer N, Monson D, Maithel SK, Cardona K. Ann. Surg. Oncol. 2019 Oct; 26(11):3542-3549.
· Features of synchronous versus metachronous metastasectomy in adrenal cortical carcinoma: Analysis from the US adrenocortical carcinoma database. Prendergast KM, Smith PM, Tran TB, Postlewait LM, Maithel SK, Prescott JD, Pawlik TM, Wang TS, Glenn J, Hatzaras I, Shenoy R, Phay JE, Shirley LA, Fields RC, Jin LX, Weber SM, Salem A, Sicklick JK, Gad S, Yopp AC, Mansour JC, Duh QY, Seiser N, Votanopoulos KI, Levine EA, Poultsides GA, Solórzano CC, Kiernan CM. Surgery. 2020 02; 167(2):352-357.
· Recurrence patterns after resection of retroperitoneal sarcomas: An eight-institution study from the US Sarcoma Collaborative. Chouliaras K, Senehi R, Ethun CG, Poultsides G, Tran T, Grignol V, Gamblin TC, Roggin KK, Tseng J, Fields RC, Weber SM, Russell GB, Levine EA, Cardona K, Votanopoulos K. J Surg Oncol. 2019 Sep; 120(3):340-347.
